


Flowers on a Razor Wire

by Enisy



Category: Original Work
Genre: Enough Angst to Rattle a German Philosopher, Hanahaki Disease, Human/Vampire Relationship, Identity Porn, Jealousy, M/M, Pining, Unrequited Love, Vampire Hunters, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:40:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26202814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enisy/pseuds/Enisy
Summary: Amidst an outbreak of mysterious skin marks, Camilo struggles to reconcile his moral code with his affections.(“Crush?” Camilo chokes out a humorless laugh. I love you, he thinks. I love you to distraction, I love you to decay, to damnation, love you love you love you.Thinks, but doesn’t say. That ship has sailed: he can just make it out on the horizon, its hull blasted by the rising storm, its sails in tatters.)
Relationships: Original Male Character/Original Male Character, Vampire Moonlighting As A Barista/Exhausted Vampire Hunter In Search Of Caffeine
Comments: 17
Kudos: 31
Collections: pine4pine 2020





	Flowers on a Razor Wire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bonster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bonster/gifts).



> Beta-read by the ever-so-patient [Duinemerwen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duinemerwen/works).

The dark red lashes cover his entire forearm now, shoulder to wrist, limning a shape quite similar to the daisy they’re named after. God, he’s in over his head, he has it _bad_ , and it’s only going to get worse from here on out. Part of him finds the sight comforting: it is a reassurance, a promise that his other symptoms of thought spirals and cold sweats and stuttering have some deeper meaning. On the other hand, it frightens him, because it vindicates his colleagues’ claims that he’s been out of sorts lately. He feels like he’s been condemned to the pillory: he’s stuck his devotion through the left hole, to people’s jeers and boos, his avarice through the right one, and through the middle one, his disgusting fondness. He doesn’t know what to do with himself anymore.

It’s _love_ , you understand.

* * *

Camilo is in dumps and dolors by the time he’s stepping into the air-conditioned hall of Grano Bros. He ran into a ‘work buddy’ on the way here: a newer recruit, Vicent, who was all rearing to investigate his neighbor. Third time in as many weeks.

“Yeah, she wasn’t a vampire on Thursday, but she might have _turned_ into one in the meantime,” he said. “Those honkers didn’t look human to me!”

Odious. And yet, Vicent has all the accouterments of a moral man: cross necklace, rosary, a teetotaler’s ribbon, and a dog that doesn’t bark. He bears the same title as Camilo, wears the same clothes, performs the same functions. It doesn’t seem quite fair. _Bad apple_ , Camilo thinks. There are more than a few bad apples these days, but he needs to believe that the orchard is still hale.

The shop smells less like coffee and more like the air freshener they’ve sprayed it with. Through the hubbub, Camilo picks out two familiar voices, and his mood sinks further.

“Erk, the left ear ran away from me. It looks more like a parasitic twin now.”

“Are you kidding? This whole cup belongs in a _museum_.”

The blackboard behind the counter sports a new motivational quote: it used to be ‘Life begins at the end of your comfort zone,’ and now it’s ‘HELLO MONDAY.’ Camilo isn’t feeling it. His eyebrows draw together, almost into a single line: a lid for the ebullient pot of his glare.

Finley is talking to _that man_ again.

“You’re so talented,” that man says, popping open the top button of his collar. There is a Margarita on his collarbone, but it is a tiny, misshapen thing – nothing like the red lattice on Camilo’s arm. He doesn’t have anything to worry about, he tells himself. He _d_ _oes_ _n’t_. “Looks like art school has paid off.”

“Yeah. Who needs a full-time job when I can draw dope kittens on a stranger’s latte?” Finley looks at the animals with undisguised hatred. “Plus or minus one ear...”

“Cute _and_ modest! C’mon, I wanna see the rest of your portfolio. Show me your website.”

Camilo cannot stand it anymore. He marches up to the pair, even though he has to cut in line, inviting oaths and exclamations from the people behind him. There is a solar-powered cactus figurine on the counter, and it jiggles its arms in welcome.

“Could I have my usual cappuccino, please?”

The manager, who is in today, gives Camilo a dirty look. The waitress shakes her dreadlocked head. Even Finley looks unimpressed: his pretty blue eyes harden, and the hairs sticking out of his bun seem more pronounced, like porcupine quills. “It’s not your turn, Cam.”

“Pardon me, but it shouldn’t be _his_ turn anymore, either. He’s holding up the line.”

“Hey, fuck you, asshole.” Camilo winces at the harsh language. “If you’re in such a hurry, why don’t you hit the Espresso Express next door?” The man – Jerome, his name comes to him in a flash – leans his elbow against the counter in a proprietary manner that sprays Camilo’s vision black and red. The cactus jiggles some more, spoiling for a fight. “Who do you think you are, anyway?”

“I’ll tell you who…”

He almost does it, then. He almost spills the beans. Granted, Jerome is _not_ a vampire – Camilo dismissed that possibility after observing him for an unconscionable amount of time – but he probably still harbors some awe toward Impalers, alias Palers. Practically everyone in the country does. If Camilo reveals his identity, it might put a stop to the alpha-male nonsense.

His wounded eyes seek out Finley, who responds with detachment, like an insurance broker studying a list of preexisting conditions. “Cam.” He is using his patient, _I’ve-had-enough-of-your-_ _crap_ tone. “Go wait your turn.”

Two more minutes of Jerome and Finley’s flirting, another six minutes until everyone else has ordered, and then it is his turn. By then at least the other staff members have dispersed, and Finley seems more amused with him than irritated. He mixes him a cappuccino with white chocolate, fussing over the foam decoration longer than Camilo had to wait in line. He doesn’t mind. Really. When Finley presents his creation with a flourish and a guarded, enigmatic smile, Camilo grins like an idiot. He pulls out his phone and snaps a careful picture of the tomcat, which is encased in a briskly whipped, cutesy, creamy-white heart.

And the ears are both perfect.

* * *

The first time Camilo comes into the shop, he has just wrapped up a lockdown in the nearby megamall and is sweat-soaked and miserable. The vampires – two – led him on a merry chase for hours, jumping between floors, knocking down shelves, crashing through walls and windows. By the time Camilo has impaled them, it’s early evening, which means he still has a ways to go before the end of his shift.

Thankfully, the city has a large Paler and vampire contingent, with one in twenty people belonging to either group, so that coffee shops are open until late. Camilo loves walking through the streets at dusk, under clotheslines and awnings, national flags and lemon trees, watching the air coil as the asphalt exhales its daily heat. The curfew is hours away, but people are already indoors, and when the breeze picks up, he can smell meat chili and dark beer. He keeps an eye out for the stenciled moon that means a shop is open after sundown.

Grano Bros looks authentic in the same way that messy hair may look ‘authentic’ after an hour before the mirror. It’s tailor-made for tourists who snub the tourism industry – and maybe that’s why Camilo is drawn to it. He is more or less a tourist himself, having been stationed in Aracuta for less than a month. The only holdovers from his previous life are his cat, his peace lily and his band posters. For the rest, his apartment looks like a cheap hotel room, down to the Bible in the top drawer.

Out of habit, and before entering the shop, he flips open his pocket watch, where five different hands are spinning round the face. It’s an old-fashioned thing, gilded and trailing a chain that clips to his belt loop. It’s also official Paler equipment, so it serves a purpose other than timekeeping. Its steady ticking speeds up instantly if a vampire comes near. The noise is very loud and disruptive, though, so regulation says he’s not supposed to open it around people – not unless he has a suspect. Together with his stake and whistle, it’s constantly weighing down his coat, reminding him of his purpose.

“What can I get you, sir?”

Whoomph.

The impact hits Camilo harder than the stab either end of a blood feud. He has the whole whirlwind experience: quickened heartbeat, clammy palms, bated breath, wedding bells in the distance. The barista’s smile is a high-security vault, and he wants nothing more than to break in.

“Sir?” A wisp of hair escapes the barista’s bun as he tilts his head. His dimples must be banned in half the country.

“Uh. Cappuccino. With white chocolate. Please.”

“You look tired,” says the barista – Finley, according to his name tag – as he sets about preparing the drink.

“So… so do you,” replies Camilo. “Too many late shifts?”

One of his shoulders goes up. “We’ve had better luck than our colleagues next door,” he says. “The Palers put their establishment on lockdown twice this month, so they had to stay there after hours. False alarms, both of them. The suspects weren’t vampires, just really pasty white dudes.”

“Oh. Well. The Palers are just trying to help.”

He scoffs. “Please! They don’t give a damn about culling the vampire population. Maybe they did in the past, but now it’s all about keeping the country under their thumb. Maintaining martial law.”

Camilo is surprised by the vehemence of Finley’s words. But he has a point. Just the other day, Samuel used his surveillance permit to get dirt on an eminent journalist, with an eye to blackmailing her next time she got on their case. And Juan beat a bartender to within an inch of his life just because his pub happened to be a big vampire hangout.

But the cause! The cause is _good_ , Camilo thinks, even if some of its agents have gone to rot. Without them, Aracuta would be overrun. Vampires only feed occasionally, but nearly every encounter is lethal. The Palers are the only thing standing between the city and anarchy: a graceful barge protecting citizens from shark-infested waters.

And yet... some days he feels like he’s the only one who holds that notion.

“– tell by their low success rate,” Finley continues. “Anyway, killing vampires isn’t gonna solve a thing.”

“What do you propose, then?” he asks, a bit brusquely.

“More funding needs to go into researching these Margaritas, man! The counties with the most Margaritas also have the most vampires. Here, lemme dig up that Buzzfeed article...”

Camilo snorts. If he’s heard this conspiracy theory once, he’s heard it a hundred times. “That correlation’s been blown way out of proportion.”

“But –”

The barista clutches the rest of his sentence to his chest, and that brings an end to the discussion.

After that, Camilo becomes a regular at Grano Bros: the coffee is good, to say the least. Finley sits at his table when business is slow, and talks to him about horror films and famous architects. He professes to hate politics, but proves weirdly knowledgeable about the subject whenever it arises. He can name all 20 major human bones and lay out the Star Trek military ranks, both naval and infantry. And it’s stupid, so stupid, that that’s all it should take, and maybe it _would_ take more if Camilo were less infatuated with his job, if he had a bigger sex drive, if he were more assertive or reflective, if he logged in more often on his dating apps. _If_ , _if_. Point is, he’s never felt this way before.

He kills more vampires than ever: not for a raise, but he gets one anyway, and not for the thrill, but he gets that, too. If he can’t have Finley, at least there’s this. Justice. Rectitude. Impaling.

* * *

Camilo has already placed his order and sat down the next time he crosses paths with his rival. As usual, Jerome strides in as if he owns the place, making a bee line for the counter and for Finley.

They seem very at ease with each other. Friendly – _more than_ , as Jerome touches Finley’s arm with two venturesome fingers and flashes his full horseshoe of white teeth. Camilo eyes them both mutinously and sulks.

Once Jerome has obtained his latte macchiato, he passes by his table: it is no accident, either. He lingers, clears his throat, and jostles Camilo’s chair with a militant hip.

A cup goes flying, its contents spilling over Camilo’s left arm. Ceramic explodes on the floor. There are mutters from the adjacent tables, a couple of shouts. Camilo curses politely as the scalding-hot coffee seeps into the fabric: “heck” and “ow” and “for God’s sake!”

Jerome simply says, “Oops.”

Before Camilo can deliberate what manner and intensity of punch would constitute a proper response, Finley steps between them with a wad of napkins. “Here, Cam, let me help.”

Some of the liquid is mopped up, absorbed away. Camilo is still so focused on Jerome’s departing sneer, he doesn’t immediately notice that the barista’s face is inches away from his. And that he’s pulled up Camilo’s sleeve.

Under the shop’s unforgiving LED lamps, his arm looks like an entire vineyard. The ruptured blood cells wind around his forearm in loops and strands, intersecting at various points. A couple segments seem to have come loose from the main stem, like plucked petals: _he loves me, he loves me not..._

Camilo thinks he’ll die of embarrassment. “Just – you can – let go of me. It’s okay.” He is already flushing, already jerking away. “I’m fine.”

Quite undeterred, Finley runs his fingers over the red welts, his face full of wonder. He gives a low whistle. “So you don’t wear your heart on your sleeve, but under it.”

His throat has closed up. “Very funny.”

Finley glances at him from under his eyelashes, smirking as if to say _I thought so_. “That’s the largest Margarita I’ve seen yet,” he remarks. “You must really like that person.”

Camilo doesn’t quite look Finley in the eye. He gives a small, noncommittal shrug.

“I think it’s beautiful.” There is a languor in Finley’s voice that he’s never heard before, even though he’s constantly in search of it, _constantly_. Every day, his ears prick up and strain for the tinkle of a key to Finley’s heart, left under an incidental doormat for him. “How long have you had it?”

“Oh… six months or so.” He shuffles uncomfortably. “It’s not getting better.”

Finley shoots him an amused look. “Never gonna happen, unless the, ah, person reciprocates, as you well know. That’s how these things work.” He glances away, steps back. “I’ll get you some ice cubes for your arm.”

* * *

The next day, Finley’s smile is vapid and his coffee art depicts a plain old spiral, the walls of his eyes soaring twenty feet high with spikes on top, and Jerome calls him “babe,” and Camilo cannot stand it, _cannot stand it_ , he’s going mad with jealousy and longing and abstinence and hatred and –

* * *

The next day, he signals a lockdown in Grano Bros.

It’s not premeditated, mind you. He doesn’t know he’ll do it until he takes stock of the only customer beside himself, a woman sitting at the third table to the left. She has all the markers of a vampire: sallow skin and furtive eyes and a sense of something to hide. It’s such a perfect opportunity.

The facts:

  * It’s a quarter to nine in the evening.

  * Curfew will roll in soon.

  * Finley is the only staff member still around.

  * _Finley is the only staff member still around._




Camilo’s train of thought trundles from station to station, and an aerial shot of the itinerary reveals a fully articulated plan, ending with the barista swooning in his arms. God, is he really doing this? Can’t he just ask him out? But no, of course he can’t, not in front of _other_ _people_ : they’d think it inappropriate, they’d judge him, they’d misunderstand. Even if they are vampires. _Especially_ if they are vampires.

Palers still mean something in this city, Camilo tells himself. He cannot tarnish their reputation with his base preoccupations.

“Excuse me,” he calls out, as the barista passes by his table. Finley doesn’t stop – hasn’t heard him, perhaps – so Camilo grabs his arm, emboldened by the sheer absurdity of his idea. “Are you feeling well rested?”

Finley pulls his arm away, but gently, without edge. “I suppose so. Why?”

“’Cause you’ll be pulling an all-nighter.”

“You –” Finley’s eyes widen in horror. “Oh, no. No, Cam, _wait_. Waitwaitwait –”

Too late: Camilo has already reached into his trench coat, produced the Palers’ trademark whistle, pressed it to his lips. It makes a sound like the sky rending to pieces. Immediately, the coffee shop is awash in red light, like one of those art installations where you get to tour the interior of an organ, a kidney maybe or a heart. He won’t be able to see them through the tinted windows, but Camilo knows his peers will surround the building within minutes, effectively barricading it.

The vampire suspect stands up, patting creases out of her blouse. She doesn’t fight or argue. She knows what is expected of her. It’s Finley who’s climbing the walls, pacing back and forth and mumbling to himself, like a mental patient. Camilo’s conscience needles at him. It’s okay, he tells himself. He’ll make it up to Finley.

He approaches the woman, putting away the whistle and taking out the pocket watch. It’s still ticking steadily, for now. She seems less skittish than before, which could mean one of two things. Either she’s human, and the secretive air was due to, let’s say, a tawdry affair… or she’s hoping Camilo will let his guard down so she can get the jump on him.

The latter is true. Before he can get close enough for the pocket watch to tick its verdict, her face changes shape, and she crouches down and launches herself at him. Camilo is mentally prepared for it, though, and he makes short work of her. A dodge to the right. A drop to a leg sweep. One, two jabs to the jaw. A precise thrust of the ceremonial stake. Through the cloud of dust, he sees Finley staring at him. His enigmatic smile is replaced by an enigmatic frown.

No Jeremy, no customers, no manager, no waitress, no chihuahuas yipping at their feet. They are alone, alone! If that woman had not been a vampire, he would have found some excuse to dismiss her, but this is a lot easier. It’s just him and Finley now, for the next seven hours at _least_. Standard protocol for lockdowns. More than once, Camilo has felt like garroting himself with the red tape of his institution, but he feels so grateful for it now.

The pocket watch seems to be keeping time with his heartbeat as he steps through the dust, like a fumigator in action. He doesn’t walk so much as wade toward Finley, barely lifting his feet. It’s part nerves, part lethargy. He didn’t get his order in before the lockdown, and the lack of caffeine is starting to make itself felt. Some corner of his awareness stays on the ticking of the pocket watch, which appears to be speeding up a little. No – a _lot_. Tick, tick, it goes, ticktick, tickticktickticktick…

* * *

Later, they sit with their backs against the counter, a few feet apart. Camilo cannot bring himself to speak: he still has not come to terms with his discovery. The red light that’s flooded the coffee shop seems to be an extension of himself, as if he’s hemorrhaging internally and there’s a ton of spillover. He glances askance at Finley’s profile. He _does_ have a fair complexion, but Camilo never imagined it could be anything but natural. It fits so well with his blue eyes and light brown hair. _Goddammit_.

“Have you been like this” – he spits out the last word like a slug of spoiled milk – “the entire time?”

“Yes.” Finley is not looking at him.

Camilo is scared to ask the next question. He molds his lips around it with difficulty: “Did you do it on purpose?”

“What?”

“Were you _trying_ to seduce me?”

Finley rolls his eyes. “I didn’t even know you were a Paler before today, Cam.” He crosses his arms with a petulant air. “So, congrats. You can take full credit for your stupid gay crush.”

“Crush?” Camilo chokes out a humorless laugh. I love you, he thinks. I love you to distraction, I love you to decay, to damnation, love you love you love you. _Thinks_ , but doesn’t say. That ship has sailed: he can just make it out on the horizon, its hull blasted by the rising storm, its sails in tatters. “What about Jerome?” he asks stupidly. “Were you...”

“Jerome?” Finley’s icy exterior briefly melts into surprised laughter. “I hate that douchebag.”

“Oh.”

Half a minute goes by, then one minute. The passage of time is relentless, inescapable, with the pocket watch ticking away inside his coat. Aggravated, Camilo yanks it out and throws it across the room.

Silence.

“So, now what?”

The question rattles the bars of Camilo’s mental cage. “I suppose... I have to impale you.”

“You say the sexiest things,” Finley jokes, but his voice is shaking, and his eyelashes glisten suspiciously. It makes Camilo feel like the scum of the earth. “Go on, then.”

Duty’s calling, and he has never failed to pick up the receiver. He scooches along until he’s almost straddling Finley’s lap, and it’s his worst nightmare and his fondest wish in one package, pain-pleasure wires crossing tortuously. The stake hangs in the air between them like a minus symbol. Camilo minus Finley equals… what? God, why didn’t he throw in the towel after the Peroches incident? Right. _The cause is good._

The vampire must read something in his eyes, some longing or hesitation, because he lunges forward and kisses him. Camilo is powerless against it, and yet a small, litigious part of him whines in protest. When he kisses Finley in his mind, it’s in a pique of glorious passion, birds singing, swell of violins. This feels too much like a transaction.

“Let me move in with you,” Finley gasps, making it worse. His expression is balancing on the knife-edge between fear and desire. It excites Camilo rather more than it should. “No one will look at me twice if I’m bunking with an Paler. And – and I can be good. I know a guy who works at a nursing home, and he gives me the peeps at death’s door.” Camilo flinches away, disgusted, but Finley pins him down. Vampires are somewhat stronger than humans, and anyway, _this_ human is hardly putting up a fight. “Hey, come on, man. Vampiric bite’s a decent way to go: it only stings a little, and you feel, like, warm and buzzed toward the end. You _want_ this. We’ll be together when you come home from work, and I’ll cook dinner, and we’ll curl up on the sofa and watch _Moon Tropics_ or something, or – or listen to your LPs.”

He doesn’t say _no_ fast enough, doesn’t say _no_ at all, and so Finley presses his advantage, quickly peeling off Camilo’s coat and button-up shirt. Realization glissades down his face when he sees Camilo’s arm again: it starts with a scrunch of the eyebrows and ends with a smile of disbelief.

“Was this all for me?” he asks, tracing the Margarita. His chuckle is one part derisive, two parts relieved. “You poor thing.”

Another kiss, open-mouthed this time, Finley’s tongue sliding against his with a wet, slippery sound. He feels fingers threading through his hair, and he reaches for Finley’s in return, grabbing the loose bun with quiet desperation. A cascade of kisses follows, down Camilo’s cheek, jaw, neck. His eyes flutter shut. In that restorative darkness, his thoughts come to a standstill: there is no more judgment, no more guilt. Just pure, uncomplicated warmth. Camilo is so blissed out, he barely even feels the teeth digging into his arm. Finley was right. It only stings a little.

Oh, _for God’s sake_.

“Let go,” he barks, yanking his arm away. A string of blood connects it to the vampire’s mouth for a moment, like a red thread of fate.

“Sorry,” Finley says. “Just a taste. We can try it again later.” His tongue sweeps his lips thoughtfully. “You’re only the second person with a Margarita I’ve had, although I can _feel_ them around me, every damn day. It’s like… it’s like when the temperature drops below zero, and your fingers are falling off from the cold, and you sense a fire burning nearby – but not, like, a candle flame, a proper _bonfire_. I swear, Aracuta wouldn’t attract so many vampires if people would just get laid more often. All those broken hearts just make the blood richer...”

Once transformed, vampires look less like their human selves and more like each other. Pointed teeth. Ashen cheeks. Opaque red eyes, like traffic lights, with heavy bags under them. Finley’s new visage is like a splash of water on Camilo’s head. He snatches the stake back up, presses it against Finley’s chest again and tries not to think. About. Anything. He focuses on his breath instead: in and out, in and out, like an old, leather bellows.

Finley shakes his head, and his human features are restored, the rabbit shoved back into the hat. “You can’t do it,” he says, smiling.

Camilo grits his teeth, but his anger won’t be quelled, and a curse word slips out for the first time in years. He drives the stake a bit harder into the vampire’s chest, testing him, testing them both. Finley’s smile lengthens and sharpens, like a switchblade. He clutches the stake tighter.

* * *

The dark red lashes cover his entire arm now, from the top of his shoulder to the tips of his nails. He has to wear gloves and long-sleeved shirts to hide them. If his fellow Palers have noticed his new, fashion-forward attire, they haven’t commented on it. He doesn’t speak much to them, anyway, preferring to work alone, away from their macho posturing and thinly veiled bigotry. Maybe it will go away before they notice.

_Never gonna happen, unless the, ah, person reciprocates, as you well know._

It’s been a productive day at work. Camilo smoked out a nest of vampires in a penthouse above the local mall, impaling all but one of them – a younger female, who managed to scurry away. They’d been living off hit-and-runs on unsuspecting shoppers for at least three weeks, sowing fear and chaos in the whole neighborhood. The mall should be a bit safer for the nonce.

“I’m home,” he calls out, shouldering the door of his apartment open. His cat mewls in acknowledgment. There is a new package next to the shoe rack, but it’s already been gutted, its innards spread out over the coffee table: a book on 18th-century art, another on erotic photography. A piercing scream comes from the living room. Probably another Cronenberg film.

The Margarita hasn’t stopped expanding: he wonders if in a few months’ time it’ll cover him whole, and he’ll be more flower than man, attracting bees wherever he goes, pollinating, thriving under the sun’s rays. Once or twice, he’s thought about having it removed: some of the modern treatments are said to be quite effective, like skin grafts, or Q-switched laser surgery. But it’s only a passing fancy – not something he could ever actually go through with.

Finley wouldn’t like it.

“Hey, cutie. Is that coffee I smell? Mmm, you know how to show a guy a good time...”

The cause is good, Camilo reminds himself, even if some of its agents have gone to rot.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [enisywrites](https://enisywrites.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr. Come on over if you want to drop me a prompt or a question, or if you just want to say hi!


End file.
